Lucien saw it.
The power.
Something dark far stronger than anything anyone should have been able to release.
And in that moment, he knew for certain that Zareth was hiding something.
His eyes moved to the tall window, catching a glimpse of his reflection against the dark glass.
At first, it was just him. Pale skin, messy black hair, and those familiar gray eyes nothing out of the ordinary.
But then, the glass seemed to ripple.
The reflection shifted. His skin took on a strange hue, his hair bled into a new shade, and the gray of his eyes ignited into something else entirely.
Zareth recoiled, his breath catching as he stared at the stranger wearing his face.
The air around him suddenly grew heavy, his aura surging with a newfound intensity. Without warning, a translucent shimmer flickered across his vision, overlaying the world in a sharp, crystalline clarity as if he were suddenly viewing the room through a lens of pure magic.
The entire movement inside the room froze, as if time itself had stopped.
Then, words appeared in Zareth's vision, almost as if they were a part of it.
[Greetings, Zareth Ashveil. Would you like to see your status]
Zareth didn't know what to do. Was he hallucinating? The soft voice drifted into his mind, delicate and light, almost like a feather.
*********************************
Host Status
Name: Zareth Ashveil
Age: 23
Level: 1
Class: Unassigned
Experience: 0 / 100
Strength: 1
Perception: 1
Agility: Unawakened
Speed: 1
Bravery: Unmeasured
Intelligence: 4
Charm: Unmeasured
Mana: Dormant
Bloodline: Sealed
Condition: Stable
*********************************
"I have Strength, Perception, Speed, and Intelligence... but every single one of them is low. Why am I so weak?"
Zareth's expression darkened.
His eyes remained fixed on the glowing words, his breathing growing uneven as each line carved itself into his mind with cruel precision.
Strength.
Perception.
Speed.
Intelligence.
He had them.
And yet every single one of them was low.
His fingers slowly curled into fists.
A bitter chill spread through his chest.
"Why..." he whispered, his voice hollow.
"Why am I this weak?"
The voice answers in a normal tone
"If you wish to become stronger, daily tasks have been assigned. Complete them within the day to earn reward points and money."
The silver words stayed suspended in front of his eyes, cold and impossible to ignore.
Zareth just stared at them.
His face slowly darkened.
"What is this?" he muttered, his voice low and uneven.
No one answered.
Only the soft hum of that strange light remained, almost like the thing watching him was waiting for him to understand on his own.
Then the screen shifted.
New words began to appear beneath the first.
*********************************
[Daily Quest (0/3)]
Walk 2 km
Progress: 0.8 / 2 km
Reward: +1 Point, 169 Money
Push-ups 10 Repetitions
Progress: 0 / 10
Reward: +1 Point, 169 Money
Focus Training 10 Minutes
Progress: 0 / 10 min
Reward: +1 Point, 169 Money
*********************************
Zareth's eyes scanned the list once.
Then again.
Finishing these tasks it would be easy. Too easy.
And yet, his gray eyes widened.
The reward.
Money?
A small number, almost laughable. But it was enough to make him pause.
A question gnawed at him.
"This is supposed to make me stronger?"
The thought left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Half a kilometer walked.
Ten push-ups.
Ten minutes of focus.
All of it minor.
Yet the system counted every step, every repetition, every second.
And somehow, that was supposed to matter.
Zareth clenched his fists. His chest tightened.
Weak.
Pathetic.
And yet he couldn't stop himself from staring at the panel again.
"The money reward is that actually real"
Zareth asked the question before he could stop himself.
The moment the words left his mouth, the silver panel flickered.
Then, almost instantly, new text formed beneath the daily quest list.
[System Respond]
[Yes]
"You can hear me? This motherfucking system can hear me?"
Zareth's voice came out sharper than he meant it to.
He kept staring ahead, but the screen didn't move.
It wasn't floating in front of him.
It wasn't hanging in the air.
It was there woven into his sight itself, as if his own eyes had betrayed him and started seeing things that weren't meant for people.
His breathing slowed.
Then turned uneasy again.
"What if I."
Zareth's words died in his throat.
The answer came before he could even finish thinking.
[System Response]
[Everything you see is being processed directly through your neural pathways]
[The interface is fused with your mind. It exists only within your perception]
[You are no longer limited by normal human senses]
[Bloodline System detected]
[Your body is unstable]
[Initial synchronization has failed]
[Resynchronization is required to prevent further collapse]
[Do you wish to proceed]
Zareth's eyes stayed on the silver letters in his vision.
"What the hell is this."
Threads of thought.
fused interface.
Bloodline System.
resynchronization.
collapse.
"Am I even human anymore."
The room, Lucien, the frozen world they didn't matter. Only the system's words echoed in his head.
"What does all this even mean am i broken."
He pressed his palms to his temples. Everything I thought I knew it's all wrong.
Zareth stood there, breathing shallow, mind spinning, caught between disbelief and a dark curiosity he couldn't shake.
"No... wait... no I need to think first. I need to process all of this."
His mind spun with confusion and curiosity, but what scared Zareth the most was the thought that the system might actually be real that it could reset him. What would happen if he accepted, Would he still be the same Zareth or would this voice just end him.
Then, slowly, the frozen world around him shivered.
Lucien's figure twitched, breaking the pause, alive once more.
The room snapped back into motion, relentless and unforgiving.
Zareth shook his head, trying to push the strange thoughts aside.
He walked toward his next class, but unlike the others, he didn't bother participating, his mind still tangled in the system's words.
m
By the time Zareth reached the next class, the others were already participating, gathered in their groups and discussing the assessment.
He had arrived just in time, but unlike everyone else, his mind was elsewhere zoned out, caught in a storm of questions he still couldn't answer.
"Will something happen if I follow it?"
"Resynchronization what the hell does that even mean? A reboot? I don't understand any of this."
Seated at the very back of the classroom, Zareth sank into deep thought, unease twisting in his chest as he wondered whether he should accept the reboot.
"Hey screen, answer me. What's going to happen if I accept your recommendation?"
[System Respond]
[You will only understand once you proceed. Only then will you feel what I am trying to convey]
[Do you wish to proceed]
[Yes or No]
10
9
8
"Wait why are you already counting down I haven't even thought this through yet."
Zareth's heart skipped a beat, pounding in his chest as panic clawed at his thoughts.
7
6
5
Zareth's hand shook, hovering over the invisible choice. His mind screamed, I'm not ready.
4
The numbers pulsed in his vision, matching the rapid beat of his heart.
3
"Stop wait" His voice barely escaped, swallowed by the silence pressing in.
2
The classroom blurred. The chatter, the movements, everything faded, leaving only the hum of the system in his ears.
1
He closed his eyes. Breath catching. Fear gnawed at him. Curiosity clawed back. And then the unknown waited.
"Yes I'll do it" Zareth muttered, heart racing. "Fuck I just hope I don't blow up or something."
He thought the moment the timer ran out, he'd explode but nothing happened. Everything was different.
The timer finally hit zero, but still nothing happened. For a moment, Zareth's vision grew heavy and blurred, the world tilting around him. His body slumped against the arm of the chair, and at that instant, he finally lost consciousness.
By the time morning came, Zareth woke to find himself lying on the floor of his room, not on the bed. Sunlight streamed through the window, spilling across his skin and face, as if trying to wake him. Yet no matter how bright the light grew, Zareth didn't stir not a blink, not a twitch, not a single movement.
A faint buzzing sound suddenly nested in Zareth's ears, and just like that, he was pulled back from his sleep, stirring once more into wakefulness.
Everything that had happened yesterday seemed to vanish from his memory, leaving no trace of why Zareth was lying on the floor in the first place.
Zareth's brows slowly pulled together.
His eyes fluttered open, unfocused at first, staring blankly at the pale ceiling above him.
For a few long seconds, he didn't move.
Didn't think.
Didn't feel.
It was as if his mind had woken up before the rest of him had.
Then, slowly, awareness crept back in.
The cold floor beneath his body.
The sunlight pressing against his skin.
The faint ache in his neck.
And the strange emptiness sitting inside his chest.
Zareth blinked once.
"What."
His voice came out rough, weak, unfamiliar even to his own ears.
He pushed himself up slowly, one hand pressing against the floor as his body dragged itself upright.
The moment he sat up, a sharp dizziness hit him.
His vision swayed.
A strange ringing passed through his skull.
[Greetings, Zareth]
The moment Zareth heard the voice, he quickly turned his head to look for whoever had spoken. But there was no one there. He was the only person inside the room.
But something about his reaction felt off, as if hearing that voice had already become familiar to him, even though he didn't know when or how it had begun.
*********************************Host Status
Name: Zareth Ashveil
Age: 23
Level: 0
Class: Unassigned
Experience: 0 / 100
Strength: 0
Perception: 0
Agility: 0
Speed: 0
Bravery: 0
Intelligence: 0
Charm: 0
*********************************
Zareth kept staring at the screen in front of him.
At first, he thought he was seeing it wrong.
That maybe his eyes were still blurry from waking up.
Zareth kept staring at the screen in front of him.
At first, he thought he was seeing it wrong.
That maybe his eyes were still blurry from waking up.
But no matter how many times he looked at it, the numbers stayed the same.
Zero.
Everything was zero.
His face slowly darkened.
"What the hell."
He looked down at his hands.
Then slowly opened and closed them.
Nothing.
No strange feeling.
No pressure.
Nothing at all.
Yesterday if that even really happened he had at least something.
Weak.
Pathetic.
But still something.
Now it felt like everything had been wiped clean.
Like someone had erased whatever was inside him and left behind an empty shell.
Zareth swallowed hard.
"Why is everything at zero."
This time, the screen answered immediately.
*********************************
[Forced resynchronization complete]
[Body and mind returned to base condition]
[Current state: Empty]
*********************************
Zareth's brows pulled together.
"Empty."
The word didn't sit right with him.
Not at all.
A strange heaviness pressed against his chest again.
That hollow feeling.
Like something important had been taken from him.
"What did you do to me."
The screen flickered once.
[I kept you alive]
Zareth froze.
His eyes locked onto the words.
For a moment, he didn't speak.
Didn't move.
Kept him alive.
His throat went dry.
"So this is the price."
No answer came.
Only silence.
Zareth exhaled slowly, running a hand through his messy hair.
"Tch."
He didn't argue anymore.
Didn't panic like before.
Somewhere along the way he had already accepted it.
The screen.
The voice.
The system.
It was real.
And right now, it was the only thing he could rely on.
"Fine," he muttered under his breath.
"Then I'll just start from zero."
As if waiting for that exact response the screen shifted.
New text appeared.
*********************************
[Beginner Task]
Stand up
Reward: +1 Strength
*********************************
Zareth stared at it.
Then let out a quiet, almost tired laugh.
"You're serious."
For a second, he just sat there.
Staring.
Then he placed his hand on the floor and pushed himself up.
His legs trembled immediately.
Weak.
Unstable.
Like they could give out at any moment.
"Damn."
he stood.
The moment he did the screen flickered.
*********************************
[Task Complete]
[Strength +1]
*********************************
Zareth blinked.
Something small shifted inside his body.
It wasn't big.
His grip tightened slightly.
"So this is how it works."
For the first time since waking up a faint, almost dangerous smile formed on his lips.
"Alright"
His eyes locked onto the screen again.
"Let's see how far this thing can take me."